Ruby: How to turn a hash into HTTP parameters?

Question

That is pretty easy with a plain hash like

{:a => "a", :b => "b"} 

which would translate into

"a=a&b=b"

But what do you do with something more complex like

{:a => "a", :b => ["c", "d", "e"]} 

which should translate into

"a=a&b[0]=c&b[1]=d&b[2]=e" 

Or even worse, (what to do) with something like:

{:a => "a", :b => [{:c => "c", :d => "d"}, {:e => "e", :f => "f"}]

Thanks for the much appreciated help with that!

Answer 1

class Hash
  def to_params
    params = ''
    stack = []

    each do |k, v|
      if v.is_a?(Hash)
        stack << [k,v]
      elsif v.is_a?(Array)
        stack << [k,Hash.from_array(v)]
      else
        params << "#{k}=#{v}&"
      end
    end

    stack.each do |parent, hash|
      hash.each do |k, v|
        if v.is_a?(Hash)
          stack << ["#{parent}[#{k}]", v]
        else
          params << "#{parent}[#{k}]=#{v}&"
        end
      end
    end

    params.chop! 
    params
  end

  def self.from_array(array = [])
    h = Hash.new
    array.size.times do |t|
      h[t] = array[t]
    end
    h
  end

end